psy1002 psychological disorders sem2 2010-2011

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Module: Introduction to Psychology

Module Code: PSY1002

Period: Semester 1 AY 2010-2011

Lecture Topic: Perspectives on Psychological Disorders

Introduction

Definition of Psychological Disorders

The three approaches (perspectives) on psychological/mental disordersExamples of mental disorders

Diagnosing a psychological disorder: The use of the DSM

Brief look at some psychological disorders

Schizophrenia

Introduction

Most persons view mentally ill persons as weird, or as persons who are “out of this world”or in a land of their own. And very few realize that most psychological problems go

unrecognized, are very common in some cases, and are recognized sometimes too late.

It is also noteworthy that some psychologically ill persons function adequately in society

and at times, will suffer their illness silently. Sometimes too silently.

So now you ask, “But how can I know when someone is experiencing such problems and

what, if anything, can I do to help?”

Let’s begin the journey to answering these questions.

Definition of psychological disorders:

It’s not exactly easy to define mental disorder because there are different perspectives on it.

Hence it is possible to view mental disorders from society’s perspective (culture), the perspective of other persons (especially medically and psychologically trained

professionals), or the perspective of affected persons. Nevertheless, we will attempt to do

so using the three approaches offered by Wade and Tavris (your required text).

Question: What are the three approaches to defining psychological/mental

disorders?

Your text (2008, pp. 370-371) agrees that defining mental disorder is difficult and offers

three specific perspectives to help us to arrive at a possible definition and better

understanding of the topic. The three perspectives are:

1. A mental disorder may be a violation of cultural standards, that is, breaches of

society’s roles and rules.

2. A mental disorder is emotional distress, for example, a person who is suffering from

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fear, depression, or anxiety.

3. A mental disorder is behaviour that is self-destructive or harmful to others. And there

are numerous examples of these: fear of exams experienced by students, alcoholism, pyromania, compulsive gambling, and hearing voices.

Wade and Tavris (2008, p 371), broadly define a mental disorder as “any behavior or emotional state that causes a person great suffering, is self-destructive, seriously impairs

the person’s ability to work or get along with others, or endangers others or the

community.”

Having just defined a mental disorder we now need to determine whether or not there’s a

difference between a mental disorder, abnormal behaviour, and insanity.

Question: What is abnormal behaviour?

“Behaviour that deviates from the norm” (Wade & Tavris, 2008, p 370).

Question: What is a mental disorder?Well, we’ll agree to use Wade and Tavris’ definition, which as you recall is:

“any behavior or emotional state that causes a person great suffering, is self-destructive, seriously impairs the person’s ability to work or get along with

others, or endangers others or the community.”

Question: What does insanity mean?

A legal term referring to whether or not a person is aware of the consequences

of his or her actions and can control his or her behaviour (Wade & Tavris,

2008, p 370). But you knew this from all the episodes of Monk and CSI andSpecial Victims Unit that you’ve been viewing weekly on the Cable or local

TV stations.

Finally, for psychologists to determine mental wellness or illness, they must refer to their

“Dictionary of Disorders” or “Bible of Psychology”, specifically, the Diagnostic and

Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, a standard reference manual published by theAmerican Psychological Association (APA).

Mental disorders have been grouped into special categories to make it easier for mental

health workers to determine whether or not and which specific condition a client may beafflicted with. So they rely heavily on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental

Disorders, more commonly referred to as the DSM. Here are a few examples to make it

easier for you to understand.

Examples of mental disorders:

Anxiety Disorders: which include

1. anxiety and panic

2. fears and phobias

3. obsessions and compulsions (Remember Monk?)

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Schizophrenia: believed to be the most common diagnosis among Jamaica’s “mad”

persons.

Mood Disorders: including

1. depression: which is often referred to as the common cold of psychology

2. bipolar disorder

Personality Disorders: including

1. problem personalities such as paranoid personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder

2. criminals and psychopaths

Learning Disorders: including1. Autism

2. Dyslexia

3. Mental retardation

4. ADHD

Table 11.1 of the required text gives additional examples that you may find interesting.

Diagnosing a psychological disorder:

As was said before, psychologists use the DSM to guide their diagnosis of psychological

conditions, and by extension, mental wellness.

The DSM “lists the symptoms of each disorder and, where possible, gives information

about the typical age of onset, predisposing factors, course of the disorder, sex ratio of

those affected, and cultural issues that might affect diagnosis” (Wade & Tavris, 2008, p371).

In making the diagnosis, psychologists must consider their client’s personality traits,medical condition(s), stresses being experienced at home and at work, as well as the

duration and severity of the problem being experienced by the client.

The advantages of the DSM include the fact that:a) it allows for improved reliability of diagnoses, and that

b) practitioners are able to definitively determine which diagnosis is

appropriate despite the fact that a number of symptoms may be shared bydifferent mental disorders.

The DSM is not without limitations however and these include:a. the danger of overdiagnosis: that is, the fear of over use by practitioners

b. the power of diagnostic labels: sticks like crazy glue and sometimes persons

are not willing to accept that a wrong diagnosis might have been made or

that the person could have overcome the problem.

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c. the confusion of serious mental disorders with normal problems: the

lumping of “ordinary difficulties with true mental illness” (p373).

d. the illusion of objectivity and universality: the belief that many disorderswere perhaps included not based on empirical evidence but rather on group

consensus which reflects prevailing attitudes rather than objective evidence.

Psychological Disorders

Now let’s take a closer but rather brief look at some common disorders.

Anxiety Disorders:

1. Anxiety: a general state of apprehension or psychological tension.

2. Chronic anxiety: marked by long-lasting feelings of apprehension and doom.

Panic attacks: short-lived but intense feelings spontaneous anxiety.3. Phobias: excessive fears of specific things or situations.

4. Obsessive-compulsive disorder: repeated thoughts and rituals are used to ward off

anxious feelings.

5. Generalized anxiety disorder: continuous, uncontrollable anxiety – a feeling of foreboding and dread – that occurs on a majority of days during a six-month period

and that is not brought on by physical causes such as disease, drugs, or drinking toomuch coffee. Symptoms include restlessness or feeling keyed up, difficulty

concentrating, jitterness, irritability, disturbed sleep, and unwanted, intrusive worries.

6. Posttraumatic stress disorder: stress symptoms including insomnia, agitation, and jumpiness which lasts more than a month after a crisis or traumatic experience and

impairs the affected person’s function

7. Panic disorder: recurring attacks of intense fear or panic, often accompanied with

feelings of impending doom or death. They often come in the aftermath of stress, prolonged emotion, specific worries, or frightening experiences.

Mood disorders:

1. Include disturbances in mood ranging from extreme depression to extreme mania.

2. Depression: reflects the feeling that something bad will happen.

3. Major depression: a serious mood disorder that involves emotional, behavioral,cognitive, and physical changes severe enough to disrupt a person’s ordinary

functioning.

4. Bipolar disorder:

Personality Disorders:

1. Involve unchanging, maladaptive traits that cause great distress or an inability to get

along with others.2. Paranoid personality disorder: involves pervasive, unfounded suspiciousness and

mistrust of other people, irrational jealousy, sercetiveness, and doubt about the loyalty

of others.3. Narcisstic personality disorder: involves an exaggerated sense of self-importance and

self-absorption.

4. Psychpaths: persons with an inability to feel normal emotions.

5. Antisocial personality disorder: a pervasive pattern of disregard for, and violation of,

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the rights of others.

Schizophrenia:

1. Also known as the cancer of mental illness.

2. Symptoms include bizarre delusions, hallucinations, disorganized, incoherent speech,

grossly disorganized and inappropriate behavior, and impaired cognitive abilities.3. Causes include genetic predispositions; structural brain abnormalities; neurotransmitter

abnormalities; prenatal problems or birth complications; and adolescent abnormalities

in brain development.

Drug Abuse and Addiction

Now let’s take a closer look at drug abuse and addiction.

Here at UTech, lecturers have noted with some measure of concern the growing use of alcohol by students, particularly at night. It is also not strange to see students early in the

morning drinking a Red Bull. And sometimes too, the pungent odour of marijuana assaults

our nostrils. We encourage a balance between learning and playing, but students need to act

responsibly when consuming alcohol and using drugs of any kind.

Now Wade and Tavris (2008, p388) tell us that addiction can be understood through theuse of two models: the biological model and the learning model. Let’s take a look at these

two models.

The Biological Model

Our biological makeup including our biochemistry, metabolism, and genetic predisposition,

is believed to predispose us to some addictive conditions. This we know from empirical

evidence due primarily to research done on addictive siblings and families. Research iscited in your text showing that men are more likely than women to become alcoholics. In

particular, we are told (p388) that, “There is a heritable component in the kind of

alcoholism that begins in adolescence and is linked to impulsivity, antisocial behavior, andcriminality …But for male alcoholics who begin drinking heavily in adulthood, genetic

factors are only weakly involved, if at all.” We are also told that persons may also inherit a

susceptibility to specific drugs, such as heroin, cocaine, or nicotine and that tracking downthe genes involved, has been difficult.

It is of interest to note that there’s a school of thought which says that this may well be a

two-way street, in that addictions may well be the result of drug abuse which changeschange brain functions, “…heavy use of alcohol, cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, or

other drugs … reduces the number of receptors for dopamine…These changes can then

create addiction, a craving for more of the drug. Hence, behaviour that started voluntarily(you chose to drink some alcoholic beverage, for example or to light “a spliff”, may

become an addiction and sometimes almost impossible to control.

The Learning Model

What one learns, one’s cultural background, and one’s environment (home, community,

school / university) play a significant role in the acquisition of addictive behaviours. Wade

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and Tavris highlight four major findings as we seek to understand the problem. They are

(2008, pp389 – 390):

1. Addiction patterns vary according to cultural practices and the social environment(it is more likely to occur in societies that forbid drinking among children, but

condone drunkenness in adults).

2. Policies of total abstinence tend to increase rates of addiction rather than reducethem (people will drink a lot when they get the opportunity to do so).

3. Not all addicts have withdrawal symptoms when they stop taking a drug.

4. Addiction does not depend on properties of the drug alone but also on the reasonsfor taking it (people who use drugs to enable them to function normally, don’t

become addicts).

In conclusion, we know that many students will tell us that they drink when they aresocializing, or just to unwind and don’t for a minute accept the possibility of becoming

addicts. But as lecturers, we need to help you to accept and appreciate that the strong

possibility does exist, consumption of alcohol and the use of drugs, can lead to addiction

and maybe, the unfortunate end of your pursuit of a degree at UTech. So we encourage youto think responsibly and to act responsibly and may you successfully complete your four

years of study here at UTech.

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psy1002 psychological disorders sem2 2010-2011

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